One of the themes of this blog seems to be related to the life of a teacher and student. Those posts seem to get the most comments, which isn’t necessarily the best way to judge the value of a post, but it’s the only way I have. Paper grading is almost finished for the semester and finals week is here. Other teachers who blog are apparently thinking similar things as they go through the drill. The Gypsy Scholar is an English teacher in South Korea who has recently written a series of posts on detecting plagiarism, and the assistance of Google in the process.
A friend once told me that he wrote a little program to easily check his students’ papers against Google. I didn’t have the courage or opportunity to ask him for a copy, but one day I may. For the most part, I don’t have to worry about students buying their papers from a paper mill because they write on subjects like “Beth Aven” and review books like Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem. Not the most popular topics. Though I see here that you can buy an original paper for $15/page, written by “retired professors” who are well-aware of the pain and frustration that students endure during research paper writing.” Actually, looking at the site a little bit more, perhaps I should consider a career change! Teach a student how to write a paper and get paid change; cheat and write a paper for him and you make the big bucks! S-i-c-k. Shouldn’t there be a law against this?
You’d think so wouldn’t you! I can’t believe that’s even allowed. It’s also a sad reflection on the American teenager and college student.
That program that your friend wrote sounds useful enough for him to make some money with it.
Thanks for the link to my blog entry — my recent entries on plagiarism seem to have garnered a lot of international attention. I infer that professors all over the world are facing the same problems with cheating students because semesters are winding down and grading is beginning — especially the marking of term papers.
I suppose that I am an English teacher though I get a peculiar feeling when I think of myself that way. I obtained my doctorate in history and did postdoctoral work in religious studies, including a year in Jerusalem as a Golda Meir Fellow . . . but one never knows where life will take one.
Thus . . . a Gypsy Scholar.
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
Jeffery – thanks for the excellent posts, and the attention you are getting is well deserved. Keep up the good work.
Happy – the student gets cheated twice – once out of his money and the second time out of the education that he needs and is paying for.
Happy Birthday Todd!
Happy birthday!!!
Todd,
Happy Birthday. You’re still a young guy, no matter what they say :-).
You have impacted your students tremendously. Keep up the hard, yet profitable work there!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TODD!
I hope your day is great and you are blessed as you look back on the past year and all the Lord has done in you and through you! To Him be glory! Thank you for your hard work to all your students.
The Lord bless you in this coming year.
Ashley
Happy Birthday Todd!!!
Happy birthday, Todd! IBEX Fall 03 loves you!!!
Oops! That last comment was from me. Guess I’m getting a little sleepy… Shalom in Yeshua, Abi Escobar
You don’t need a special program to easily check on plagiarism. I just looked up the references students gave in their research paper- either looked at the book or checked out the internet site they cited. In one year, out of 25 papers I graded, I found that 5 of them had heavily plagiarised. This was at a major state university. Most of them intermixed their own paragraphs with paragraphs cut and pasted from websites. After editing papers for a while it is easy to pick up differences in what the student wrote and what they copied. I highlighted the plagiarised paragraphs and printed out the websites and gave them to the professor I was TAing for. Unfortunately, his actions were limited to explaining what plagiarism was in class, and he came to the conclusion that they just didn’t know what plagiarism was… yeah right. Two of the students went on to grad school, and none of students were punished in any way… except for me- I was not asked to TA that class again. The most ironic thing is that is was for an Ethics class! The Ethics professor is the most unethical man I know.
If students are plagiarising the entire paper, it would be more difficult to pick up on inconsistencies.
Beth – you’re right, assuming the student gives the source. It’s more difficult when they do not (whether out of ignorance or trying to obscure their source). That’s when Google cam come in handy in tracking the source down. I’m sorry to hear of your Ethics professor’s response.
I was introduced to my M.Div. thesis topic by two or three posts on Phil Johnson’s blog which will make for some funny footnotes. I’m not sure whether to put “PyroManiac” in the footnote or not.
On a more interesting note, I’m going to have to deal with the issue of how to cite ideas that I got in the comments section of the blog. Because there was so much discussion on some of these issues and because there are so many ideas in those discussions that I could pull from, I’m finding that it will be difficult to find a way to give credit where credit is due. What’s your take on citing (and how to cite) ideas that you get in conversations, whether in person or online (like blog commenting)?
At this point, I’ll just check the thesis citation guidelines, check with my professor, use common sense, and be creative in trying to make sure the reader knows what were my ideas and what were someone else’s.
Gunner – I think it’s much more important to cite published works than unpublished. Blog comments are more like talking in the lounge with friends. For any “big” ideas, you can note such in a footnote, or maybe put something about the genesis of the idea in your preface (if you have one). In an article I was reading last night, the author had a footnote which said something, “Thanks to Jeff Jones for pointing this reference out to me.”
Hi, Todd –
I found your article in a Google search for blogs that I could point to from my Web site. I’ve recently created a free Web-based program that makes it easier for teachers to check for plagiarism online. It’s at http://www.PlagiarismChecker.com.
I’m also working on adding handouts to the site; please let me know if there’s anything I can add that would be useful for teachers like us. You can reach me at secondary at teachbible dot com if you want.
Have a wonderful day and God bless!
– Darren Hom
Teacher at Highlands Christian Schools
I’m teaching 10th grade history (U.S./high schools, age 15 or so). Perhaps younger students are more likely to wander/sneak into plagiarism, but I’ve had some really bad years (and some that are not that bad). I once grabbed a random stack of 20 papers and found 10 had either plagiarized or had such serious mis-citing that they received an ‘E’ or ‘D’. So I’ve come to look at papers pretty closely–finding much of what has already been said, to be true:
–with experience, it’s easy to spot,
–google works pretty well to find the original sources, but students often include the one/few sources they plagiarize in their ‘works cited’ page
–students often claim innocence and actually seem surprised when confronted.
I’m reading this site/these comments because of the latter scenario. An ‘A’ student wrote a paper largely consisting of others’ words. She has some citations–but many are wrong/false. It’s a cut and past job. She doesn’t see it that way. I wanted to be on firm ground in maintaining my charge of ‘plagiarism’ so I showed it to a few fellow teachers. I expected them to be outraged by the degree/extent of obvious wrong-doing on her part. They all said not to push the matter–to let it get a lesser punishment of some sort–because she can claim some degree of misunderstanding based on having given SOME citations.
I’m kind of sickened.
I’m also doing some self examination–DID I teach clearly enough what it means to paraphrase? When it’s O.K. to do so?
I think I’ll invite her and her parents to discuss it and offer her the chance to show where/how she came by her mis-citations. It may be that she really didn’t have the ‘intent’ that one of my colleagues said is necessary for the charge of plagiarism to fully/accurately apply, but I worry she’ll ‘get away with’ something and do the same thing with someone else.
I’m thinking of a recent radio discussion of plagiarism and a comment that a lot of teachers let students ‘go’ because they think the student made a mistake–then find that other teachers did the same thing for the same student(s). We have listings of sex offenders (at least, here, in the U.S.), why not a listing of those who’ve been warned/etc. re plagiarism? I don’t mean to equate the two kinds of wrong-doing, but it burns me up to have this kind of bold-faced cheating going on to this extent and no real punishment be given.
hathawas – you are in the thick of the battle. It must be very tough when your colleagues don’t work with you. I am fortunate to not have that struggle. At my school, any offense like plagiarism requires a report to the VP of Academic Affairs so that he can keep track of things like this (and ensure the same student isn’t doing it and getting away with a warning in all of his/her classes). It’s hard but I encourage you to press on; it’s worth it for the students.